Poker Players: Avoiding Sucker Bets at the Casino

First and foremost; avoid Keno like the plague. If you came to the casino to play the lottery (which, will show you on the ticket just how bad your odds of winning are) you really need to check your priorities in why you’re gambling in the first place. Keno has some of the worst odds of any game in the casino, with a house edge of 25%! Compare that to the small percentage edge the house enjoys at black jack and you'll see the difference. This is why you see very few players at the game; and why many casinos are eliminating the game altogether; it’s now common knowledge that Keno is a sucker bet.

If your casino has one of the “big wheel” type games that have dollar amounts affixed to a large wheel of fortune style wheel, avoid the game at all costs. Once again, the odds and amounts are skewed heavily towards the casino, though it varies from casino to casino. The less skill and more luck a game takes to play, the more likely the casino is pushing a large edge, something the completely random wheel of fortune style games love to attack. The house edge on average at the big wheel? 19%.

The biggest sucker bet that you’ll find at a casino, and one that players give hardly any notice to, are the side bets on table games like Let It Ride, Caribbean Stud, and so on. These bets promise big payouts when you do make the big hands in their respective games; the problem is, the payouts for everything else are so bad, and the minimum hand to get paid with is so high, that they make a staggering 30-47% off of every dollar you put in, depending on the jackpot! If they don’t have a jackpot, only a max amount paid, you lose 47 cents for every dollar you carelessly flick into the side bet! Think about that the next time you want to take the side bet playing any of your favorite table games...